I got my text message at 1:40 this morning -- Joe Biden (D-DE) will be our nation's 47th vice-president come January.
They're undoubtedly dancing in the streets of Wilmington, my hometown. One of my claims to fame in Arkansas is that I am one of the few people I know who has actually voted for Joe Biden in the past.
I'm proud to say that he was my senator for a couple of years.
I'm going to be working my Delaware connection all weekend here in Denver, looking for interviews with the First State's delegation.
Now if you'll excuse ME, I have to go collect my winnings in the Washington Center VP poll.
I think I may have won at least $50.
I posted my first story from the convention with Arkansas Business Weekly yesterday.
t was an embellishment of a story I first posted here about the importance of HRC's speech at the convention on Tuesday night. You can read it here.
I guess the other big news is that I learned yesterday that I have been accepted to work at Invesco Field as a "community volunteer" on Thursday night for Senator Obama's acceptance speech here in Denver.
The good news is that I'll be there; the bad news is that it looks like I'll be there *all day* Thursday.
Depending on the wireless situation at Invesco, that may limit what I'm able to write on the biggest day of the convention.
Stay tuned.
The next time you hear John McCain or one of his spokespersons suggest that Barack Obama is not like other Americans, ask yourself how many Americans would be stumped when asked the following question:
"How many homes do you own?"
Most Americans can tell you without thinking about it very much but Senator McCain isn't sure...
From Politico.com: "Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said in an interview Wednesday that he was uncertain how many houses he and his wife, Cindy, own. 'I think — I'll have my staff get to you,' McCain told Politico in Las Cruces, N.M. 'It's condominiums where — I'll have them get to you.' "
The correct answer is at least four, located in Arizona, California and Virginia but Newsweek estimated this summer that the John and Cindy McCain own at least seven properties.
But it could be higher. Who really knows?
One year ago, Hillary Clinton was probably thinking that Denver 2008 was going to be her moment.
She was probably right, even in the absence of securing the right to lead the Democratic ticket in November.
It would appear by all accounts that the success of Barack Obama in November is going to hinge on what HRC says in the Pepsi Center in Denver on Tuesday night. In fact, it could be argued that until she makes that speech, Hillary Rodham Clinton is the most important person associated with the DNC right now.
Polling data bears this out.
This started out as a good week for John McCain. The Russia-Georgia crisis worked to his advantage, particularly in light of Barack Obama's Hawaiian vacation. His conversation with Rick Warren at Saddleback Church probably gave the Republican party's fundamentalist base enough information to assure them that Senator McCain supports the issues they are most concerned about. And there is some evidence of "Obama fatigue" in both the media and among undecided voters.
The good news (for Obama supporters) is that that many of of those undecided voters are Democrats who supported Hillary Clinton in the primaries and who have yet to be prodded by the Clintons to get behind Obama.
MSNBC's First Read reports:
Even after she ended her presidential bid back in June, perhaps we should have guessed that this presidential contest (or at least the convention) was still going to be about the Clintons. And our new NBC/WSJ poll is the latest evidence to back this up. In the survey, Obama leads McCain by three points, 45%-42%, which is down from his six-point advantage last month. Our pollsters identified a few factors behind the tightening race -- the Russia-Georgia conflict, McCain's negative ads, and lingering doubts about Obama -- but the biggest reason why this race remains close in this Dem-leaning political environment is because of Obama's inability to close the deal with some of Clinton's supporters. According to the poll, 52% of them say they will vote for the presumptive Democratic nominee, but 21% are backing McCain and an additional 27% are either undecided or want to vote for someone else. For that reason, NBC/WSJ co-pollster Peter Hart (D) says Clinton's convention speech on Tuesday, as well as when her name is put in nomination, will be significant. "The Democratic convention is more than a coronation," Hart explains. "It is an event where the words of Hillary Clinton are probably going to be exceptionally important."
The dilemma for HRC is that she has to sincerely and convincingly rally her troops to get behind Obama if she ever wants to run for president again. Anything less would be seen by the Democratic base (liberals and African-Americans) as a sell-out designed to promote her own interests of those of the party.
My guess is that she will make the speech and then hit the trail hard for Obama in swing states, particularly with white, working-class voters. I don't think it can be assumed that Bill Clinton will do the same thing.
There will inevitably come a time when Bill and Hillary Clinton don't suck the air out of a room when they step into it and will cease to be the center of the Democratic Party universe.
That time certainly won't come before Tuesday night but it has to come before Wednesday morning if Democrats hope to make victory in November a reality.
Toby Keith, perhaps best known to non-country audiences for his post-Sept. 11 song "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue," says he's a Democrat, and was impressed by the senator from Illinois.
Keith has said in the past that the 2002 song — which included lines aimed at the Taliban like "we lit up your world like the Fourth of July" — was more patriotic than pro-war.
Asked while promoting his new movie "Beer For My Horses" about the role of patriotism in the current presidential election, Keith replied: "There's a big part of America that really believes that there is a war on terrorism, and that we need to finish up.
"So I thought it was beautiful the other day when Obama went to Afghanistan and got educated about Afghanistan and Iraq. He came back and said some really nice things.
"So as far as leadership and patriotism goes, I think it's really important that those things have to take place. And I think he's the best Democratic candidate we've had since Bill Clinton. And that's coming from a Democrat."
I watched enough of the Obama-McCain confab with Rick Warren last Saturday night to develop at least two observations.
You can read a full transcript here.
My first thought is that a significant segment of the American public has a rather unhealthy obsession with the religious views of presidential candidates in spite of the fact that the framers wrote a "no religious test" clause into our constitution.
I've always appreciated that clause, even though we've never done a good job living up to it.
The framers certainly seem to have understood that the quickest was to disqualify an otherwise capable decision-maker from office was to subject him/her to a spiritual litmus test.
This topic actually came up in my Washington Center small group meeting earlier this week when one of my international students asked me why Americans talked about religion so much during elections. For most of them, this was a very odd topic to focus so much attention on during a presidential campaign.
In light of the religious test clause, I suggested that there were any number of "unofficial" qualifications we use for candidates and religious faith is just one of them.
The second observation is that Barack Obama should get points for just showing up to visit with Rick Warren and his minions at Saddleback Church. It appeared to me that it was a McCain-friendly audience and that Obama's answers were a little too brainy and reflective for a largely knee-jerk, conservative audience.
And while Pastor Warren has received high marks for this event, I'm not really sure it helps most voters all that much when candidates are interrogated for an hour about about something as personal as their faith or their prayer life.
Moreover, what's going to happen if some other best-selling evangelical minister decides that he wants to conduct an interview with Obama/McCain in the next few weeks? I'd like to think that both campaigns will have enough sense to say "No thanks, we think we've had enough of this..."
Maybe you have some better thoughts than I do.
One of the frequent criticisms of Barack Obama leveled by both the GOP and HRC was is lack of "experience" as a public servant, particularly in the area of foreign affairs.
The historical pattern would seem to indicate that it doesn't really matter -- presidents with vast prior experience before coming to office as well as those with little prior experience both seem to become high and low performers once in office.
Michael Genovese made several interesting observations about this argument in a historical context today at our morning meeting with the Washington Center Campaign 2008 faculty and students and presented the following pattern of experience versus performance in both domestic and foreign affairs:
Don't tell my employers but I've got $5 riding on Joe Biden in the Washington Center vice-presidential faculty pool.
And he's now moved onto the very short list and there may be an announcement by the end of the week.
ME and at least three other people on the WC faculty picked Biden in the pool the other night. I was tempted to go with a long shot but somebody already beat me to Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Hegel.
It looks like I could win a cool $50 (for the charity of my choice, of course).
In an online video, Stuart Shepard of Focus on the Family recently asked members to pray that rain of Biblical proportions would fall on Barack Obama’s acceptance speech at Invesco Field in Denver on August 28.
Focus on the Family has now pulled that video from its website because:
A) The Denver weather forecast calls for clear skies and zero precipitation on August 28.
B) The Obama campaign raised $40 million in two weeks to put a temporary roof on Invesco Field.
C) The Lord only does that kind of thing for Republicans on election day.
D) Focus on the Family is now asking members to pray for locusts, frogs, boils and the death of the first born child of every Democrat.
E) People were taking Stuart seriously.
If you said “E”, you are correct.
Really, Stuart. You need to send out some kind of code words to let us know when you're not serious about your prayer life.
Otherwise, you're wasting the time of thousands of mindless followers.
For accomplishing something that I would never have thought possible.
You have made Paris Hilton appear talented, funny and smart.
Nice job (viewer discretion advised)...
Stuart Shepard of Focus on the Family wants you to pray for something pretty important.
He wants you to ask the Lord to:
A) End to all wars.
B) End poverty in all parts of the world.
C) Help researchers find a cure for every imaginable disease.
D) Bring an end to prejudice, racism and ethno-nationalism in our lifetime.
E) Make it rain on Barack Obama's acceptance speech at Invesco Field in Denver on August 28.
If you said "E", you are correct.
Shepard serves up some rather convoluted theology as well. If it does rain on Obama (and ME) in Denver, he's going to take credit for it. If it doesn't rain, he's okay with that.
Like Senator McCain, I suspect that Shepard also has 18-year old interns running things for him.
h/t: kk
Apparently, the media's obsession with Barack Obamaincludes the candidate's own weblogs.
Word analysis from Wordle.net shows that the most frequently used word on both Barack Obama's and John McCain's blog is "Obama".
Senator McCain's name doesn't appear anywhere on Barack Obama's blog.
John Schwenkler used Wordle.com to find the word frequencies.
h/t: jf
Well, with the Delaware GOP anyway.
I feel your pain, Jan.
After looking as the McCain campaign ad comparing Barack Obama to Brittany Spears and Paris Hilton and an offer at JohnMcCain.com to give a Barack Obama tire gauge to anyone who makes a $25 contribution, I have concluded that John McCain's presidential campaign is being run by 18-year old interns.
Prove me I'm wrong.
At the start of presidential primary process, I suggested to several people that Mitt Romney might have a problem courting Christian evangelical "values" voters because he's a Mormon.
Apparently, that also applies to any aspirations Romney has for becoming John McCain's vice-president.
Prominent evangelical leaders are warning Sen. John McCain against picking former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney as his running mate, saying their troops will abandon the Republican ticket on Election Day if that happens. They say Mr. Romney lacks trust on issues such as outlawing abortion and opposing same-sex marriage and because he is a Mormon. Opposition is particularly powerful among those who supported former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in the Republican presidential primaries earlier this year.
Prominent evangelical leaders are warning Sen. John McCain against picking former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney as his running mate, saying their troops will abandon the Republican ticket on Election Day if that happens.
They say Mr. Romney lacks trust on issues such as outlawing abortion and opposing same-sex marriage and because he is a Mormon. Opposition is particularly powerful among those who supported former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in the Republican presidential primaries earlier this year.
As usual, the Religious Right wants public leaders whose values are founded in religion.
Just not that religion.
So if Mitt gets the nod, it could mean mean "goodbye GOP base" in 2008.
There's also this little problem: Candidate McCain's mother doesn't like Mormons either.
There's a good read in the Christian Science Monitor today about the Knoxville church shootings.
The crux of the article is that the attack was a combination of a marginalized human being, poor economic conditions and a vulnerable target: a "liberal" church.
Sadly, attacks like this one are becoming far too common in America.
Mr. Adkisson's is certainly not the first person to feel victimized by society but in this case, his vengeance was incredibly delusional...
To be sure, any direct connection between the shootings and the nation's economic woes is hard to verify, says Cecil Greek, a criminologist at Florida State University in Tallahassee. More likely, Mr. Greek says, Adkisson's alleged outburst may have been tied into suddenly jarred expectations – in his case, his ability to find a job and even stay on food stamps – at a time when a majority of Americans are questioning the country's course and many are feeling an economic pinch.
Several other reports have cited Adkisson's inability to stay on food stamps as something that triggered his attack on the Unitarian Universalist Church.
I think it is fair to say that food stamps are a product of "liberal" social legislation. If many of the conservatives I know had their way, Mr. Adkisson would never have seen a food stamp to begin with.
Because in some minds, poverty programs begin and end with "get a job."
So, in a sense, Adkisson attacked the very people who cared about him the most.
Most mornings, I begin my day with "Morning Joe" as in Joe Scarborough on MSNBC.
The most endearing features of "Morning Joe" are "News You Can't Use", news updates from Mika Brzezinski and frequent visits from Pat Buchanan who normally rises from his cot in a janitor's closet at NBC studios around sunrise and immediately starts railing on camera about Barack Obama's lack of support among blue collar Irish Catholics.
Joe usually does a good job of getting my dander up but by the end of my morning bike ride, my dander is right back were it ought to be.
Scarboriugh is a former Florida ("Redneck Riviera") congressman and lapsed Southern Baptist who claims to know the evangelical mind. One of his favorite lines of attack is to skip all the "liberal" ad hominems and immediately accuse someone (usually Mika) of being a Marxist.
As such, he likes guests who are either former congressmen, Washington insiders, Hollywood celebrities, and Mike Huckabee. I've always suspected that Scarborough's support for Huckabee is a form of Baptist penitence for his suggestion that Fred Thompson's wife was a stripper.
And, like President Bush and Senator McCain, he likes to tout his lack of intellectualism when it's obvious a guest knows more about a problem than he does. Scarborough generally likes to get these people on camera as quickly as possible.
I like MSNBC but I think "Morning Joe" is a prime example of everything that's wrong with the mainstream media as it reports and discusses presidential campaigns. Namely, that it's crucial for the MSM to make the process as entertaining as possible.
The latest meme is that in spite of the tremendous publicity and positive reception given to Barack Obama, Scarborough, Buchanan and company have continued to beat the dead horse that Obama has failed to "seal the deal."
Well...
It's easy to sit back and wonder why with all of the gaffes and missteps by John McCain in the last few weeks and the domestic and foreign policy failures of the incumbent party, why Obama is not ahead by 15 points in every poll, three months before the election.
The reason is pretty simple (imho): Voters are still getting to know Obama, particularly in middle America. They seem to know John McCain and he's already hit his ceiling with respect to national polls while Obama hasn't.
But stayed tuned. I suspect when Obama does get to that 15 percent lead in national polls that Joe & Co. will attribute it to John McCain's poor performance or just set the bar a little higher for Senator Obama.
Like President Bush, Senator McCain likes to joke about what a bad student he was in school.
In the president's case, the gag usually goes like this: "I may not be the smartest guy in the room but I'm still the president."
But 4,000 Americans lives and $540 billion later, the president’s jokes just don’t get big yucks any more.
The good news is that this election is starting to look more and more like one of my favorite West Wing episodes.
"Crime, boy... I don't know."
The message below really touched a nerve with ME and the author has given me permission to share it.
It comes from Al Price in Memphis.
I'm starting to feel more and more that the angst among many Christian evangelicals about Barack Obama becoming our nation's 44th president is based on race as much as anything. Al's email makes it pretty clear that's what he's seeing and hearing in his community.
On my best days, I like to think we're better than this as both Christians and Americans. But I'm also starting to think that I've been naive when it comes to the abject racism that still lingers within the hearts of many of the people who share a pew with me on Sunday mornings.
On the eve of the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln closed his first inaugural address with a plea for union and hope that all Americans would be "again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."
Maybe we're no closer to accomplishing that mission than we were in 1861 and I've just been engaged in wishful thinking for most of my adult life.
In either case, I'm committing myself to lifting up a prayer every day to ask that that the "better angels" will find and touch the people Al describes in his message.
*****
Dear Brethren:
One of my favorite quotations comes from the great German reformer Martin Luther: "If I profess with the loudest voice and clearest exposition every portion of the truth of God except precisely that little point which the world and the devil are at that moment attacking, I am not confessing Christ, however boldly I may be professing Christ. Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battlefields besides is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point."
Today, the devil is attacking and Christians appear not only to be oblivious to its nature but even embracing the message and the behavior. Whether other voices will be raised against this onslaught, I know not, but I do know that I must speak now. I'm taking this means to do so and to be on record. None of our Christian papers will publish an article of this type.
We are discovering that there is a latent form of racism existing among our brethren, just waiting for an opportunity to reveal itself. That opportunity came when it appeared that an African American would be the nominee of his party for the presidency of the U.S. In the past three months, I have been appalled at the racist messages coming from preachers, church leaders, and members, in sermons, in Bible classes, word of mouth, and via e-mail. It appears there is a sense of justification for the racist expressions and sending deliberate lies in supporting another candidate and party.
At the beginning of a Bible class a church leader said, "I'm sure by now that all of you have seen the sad report on the evening news. It was announced yesterday that the Rose Garden at the White House was being torn up. It is being replaced by a watermelon patch." (Laughter) And another leader responded, "And I hear they are changing the food to chitterlings." (Laughter)
Here is an e-mail from a Christian: "Knock, knock. Who's there? Eyes! Eyes who? Eyes your new president."
Another e-mail from a Christian quoted the candidate as saying, "When I'm president, everyone will have a job." The picture shows a large crowd of African Americans fleeing. The caption reads: "The candidate just lost the black vote."
A preacher sent me an e-mail that declared the candidate is a Muslim, identified with the anti-Christ in Revelation, doesn't put his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance, took the oath of his office on the Quran, associates with the Taliban, and quoted him as saying that if there were ever conflict between America and the Muslims, he would choose the Muslims, etc. When the veracity of these claims was challenged, he said, "I don't care."
Another preacher declared from the pulpit: "This is the scariest election we as Christians have ever faced. From the looks of the polls, the Christians aren't voting Christian values."
When did God give us the right to engage in such behavior (spreading lies and racism) when defending a political choice?
know that many Christians, when unable to defend such negative stereotyping, will spring the abortion issue as if that allows them to engage in the behavior above. I've written some thoughts on that topic as well. Should you wish to consider how this issue has been "used" for the past 28 years to garner support for a party, I'll send it to you.
Sincerely, Al Price
Holy smokes... Let's go ahead and vote. How many electoral votes does Berlin have these days anyway?
And if John McCain is waiting for Obama to give a bad speech, it's not a good strategy.
People of the world - look at Berlin!
Look at Berlin, where Germans and Americans learned to work together and trust each other less than three years after facing each other on the field of battle.
Look at Berlin, where the determination of a people met the generosity of the Marshall Plan and created a German miracle; where a victory over tyranny gave rise to NATO, the greatest alliance ever formed to defend our common security.
Look at Berlin, where the bullet holes in the buildings and the somber stones and pillars near the Brandenburg Gate insist that we never forget our common humanity.
People of the world - look at Berlin, where a wall came down, a continent came together, and history proved that there is no challenge too great for a world that stands as one.
See the entire speech here.
Electing Barack Obama president instantly makes us a better nation in the eyes of the rest of the world.
